| ■ Infectious Diseases Spreading Faster Than Ever: WHO | 2007.08.27 |
| International air travel is a major reason why infectious diseases are spreading faster than ever before, putting the world at high risk for a major epidemic, the World Health Organization says in its annual report. To reduce the risk, the WHO said countries need to boost efforts to fight disease outbreaks, and must share virus data in order to develop vaccines, BBC News reported. "Given today's universal vulnerability to these threats, better security calls for global solidarity," WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said in an introduction to the report. "International public health security is both a collective aspiration and a mutual responsibility," she said. Since the 1970s, 39 new diseases have appeared in the world, the report said. In just the last five years, the WHO has identified more than 1,100 epidemics involving a number of diseases such as bird flu, cholera and polio, BBC News reported. |